Prospect Street (11 page)

Just months ago her life had been predictable, perhaps even boring.

She squeezed her eyelids tightly shut.

Well, no one could say her life was boring now.

L
ydia and Joe hadn't slept in the same bedroom since moving to Great Falls ten years ago. When engaging the architect, Lydia had insisted on separate bedroom suites and vetoed a design that placed them in the same wing. She wanted open spaces, soaring ceilings, and Joe as far from her bedroom as possible.

Separate suites had made little difference in their relationship. Long ago the Hustons had come to an understanding. Whatever tender emotions they'd felt at the beginning of their marriage had melted in the crucible of Hope's kidnapping. But if they couldn't have a fulfilling marriage, they could at least have one that appeared fulfilling to the world at large.

Every Sunday after church the Hustons compared calendars at the Old Ebbitt Grill, a power breakfast favorite where they could be seen and remarked on. Over waffles or eggs Benedict they penciled in time with Faith and her family, along with state dinners, and Joe's committee meetings and responsibilities to his constituents, including overnight trips to his three Virginia offices. Joe, for all his faults, was almost fanatically devoted to his job and the people he served.

This morning Lydia had insisted they skip church and have breakfast at home. She wasn't certain Joe could act the part of senator while discussing his daughter and her new living arrangements. Lydia had expected him to be angry when she turned over the Prospect Street house to Faith, but he had moved beyond anger to brutal sarcasm. She didn't want to chance being overheard.

She was still setting pastries and scrambled eggs on the buffet when Joe came into the breakfast room. Without a word of greeting he poured a cup of coffee, then slammed it on the table so that drops sprayed over the brand-new French country tablecloth. Lydia watched the coffee bridge what had been a snowy space between rose and lavender bouquets and wondered if she'd been mistaken not to meet with Joe on neutral turf.

“Marley's in the kitchen,” she pointed out. “Let's be civilized, shall we?”

“Marley knows which side her bread is buttered on, and who pays for it.”

“She pays for every slice with hard work.” Marley, their housekeeper, ran the Hustons' lives with calm efficiency.

Joe dropped into his chair. “Lydia, I have no stomach for rhetoric this hour of the morning, and I'm in a hurry. I'm going into the office.”

“Marley made some of the cinnamon rolls you like so much.”

“I'll take one with me.”

“We need a few minutes to go over next week's calendar so neither of us misses anything important.”

“Genevieve can call you about mine tomorrow.” Joe, who believed that women belonged in the home, nevertheless surrounded himself with them at work. Genevieve, his personal secretary, was another model of female efficiency.

Lydia served herself a croissant before she took a seat across from her husband. “I don't want to talk to Genevieve. If I did, I would have invited her to breakfast.”

“What's the problem? Do you suddenly have more nasty revelations for me? Faith is going to live in that Georgetown rat trap where her baby sister was kidnapped. What's next?”

“We lived there. Remember?”

His eyes blazed. “Oh yes, I remember.”

She paused for a moment, hoping to give her words more weight. “I don't have any new revelations. I simply want to talk this through. I don't want you taking out your bad temper on Faith and the children.”

“Try this on. She brought it on herself.”

Lydia was used to Joe's narrow take on the world, but this time he surprised her. “I'm sorry?”

“If Faith had been woman enough for David, David would have been man enough for her.”

Lydia hadn't realized Joe could still shock her. “That's ridiculous.”

“If our daughter was a better wife, she would still have a husband.”

“If that's what you planned to say to her every day, I'm glad they didn't move in with us.”

“Do you have any idea how much ribbing I've gotten about this?”

She leaned forward to make sure he was paying attention. “This isn't about you.”

He dropped his fist on the table, and the coffee sprayed again. “And now she's dragged my grandchildren to Prospect Street. Tell me, just tell me, how that's going to help anything.”

“Well, for one thing, there's nobody in the row house to bully her.”

“You really ought to be more careful about the things you say.”

“Why?” Lydia picked up her own cup, but she lowered her voice. “Your threats haven't worked for a long time. I know too much about you, and you know too much about me. So here's what we're going to do. Marley and I are driving to Prospect Street this morning to help Faith clean and unpack. About noon,
Faith will get a delivery from a Capitol Hill florist. The card reads ‘Happy Housewarming, Dad.' The order's already been placed.”

“If you think that's going to change anything, you're dead wrong. Faith knows how much I disapprove.”

“Maybe, because she lived with you all those years, and she knows you never forget or forgive even the slightest prick. But your grandchildren haven't quite caught on.”

“Has it occurred to you, Lydia, that by living on Prospect Street, Faith might discover a thing or two you don't want her to know?”

Lydia's gaze traveled beyond her husband to two adult deer standing like statues at the edge of the woods behind their house. Ten years ago, when she found this land, she believed the move to Great Falls would finally bring her peace. But she had been naive, even foolish, to think that trees and windows and wildlife would solve the problems of her life.

She turned back to her husband and carefully set down her cup. “The row house has always held secrets, hasn't it, Joe? I guess you and I will have to trust that it gives up only the best.”

 

The spinet man was sitting at one of two outdoor tables with his newspaper when Faith and the children made their way to Booeymongers for breakfast. The morning was nearly perfect, sunny, but mild enough to make outside dining a pleasure. One glance at the line and Faith knew she and the children wouldn't be sitting anywhere inside or out. It was going to be takeout breakfast among the boxes.

The man—whose name she couldn't recall—looked up, saw them and grinned. “Hey there. How's the unpacking?”

Faith made a detour to his table. “I'm sorry, I've already forgotten your name.”

He lumbered to his feet, shoving the table a foot forward as he did. “Pavel. Pavel Quinn.”

He looked expectantly toward the children, and she made the introductions, struggling to pronounce his name as he had.
“Pah-vyel,” with the stress on the first syllable. Remy clearly couldn't have cared less, but Alex looked interested.

“What kind of name is Pavel?” He pronounced it perfectly. “It sounds like a last name.”

“Russian.” Pavel said the word with relish—and an exaggerated accent.

“Cool.” Alex was clearly impressed.

“It's a zoo here on Sundays,” Pavel said. “Would you like to join me?”

“Oh, no, I—” Faith was interrupted by her son's whoop.

“Cool,” Alex finished. “Then we can watch people go by.”

“I'll be here waiting.” Pavel picked up his paper, and Faith knew she'd been bested.

By the time they returned, Pavel was feeding bits of toast to two pigeons who'd made themselves at home under the table. He was dressed much as he'd been yesterday, shorts, a rumpled T-shirt—although this one, at least, wasn't splattered. He'd shaved and combed his hair, and he looked at the very least presentable.

“Pigeons carry germs.” Remy plunked her tray on the table across from him.

“These pigeons come with the Surgeon General's seal of approval.” Pavel finished crumbling his toast and dusted off his hands. “Meet Laurel and Hardy.”

“They have names?” Alex took the seat on Pavel's right.

“All God's creatures have names. You just have to concentrate hard to hear them.”

Remy snorted. “Who are you, Doctor Doolittle?”

“God named them Laurel and Hardy?” Faith took the last chair, uncomfortably close to Pavel, who seemed to take up more than his share of space. “God has a sense of humor?”

“You only have to look around to see what a sense of humor she has.”

“She?” Remy looked disgusted. “You're calling God a she?”

He gave a loose-limbed shrug.

“God is a man,” Remy said.

Faith tried to head off Pavel. “People all over the world see God in different ways.”

“Then they're wrong.”

Pavel smiled at Remy, as if he remembered a time when he had known everything, too. “So, do you think you're going to like living in Georgetown?”

“No way.” Remy ducked her head and started on her bagel.

Faith shook her head, and this time Pavel smiled at her. “How about you?”

“Do you?”

He sprawled in his chair, making himself comfortable. “I do.”

“Did you grow up here?”

“California.” He turned to Alex. “How about you, champ? Your sister's certain, and your mom is undecided. Do you think you'll like it here?”

“Oh, sure.”

“Good. What are you going to like about it?”

Alex considered. “I think it's a place where you can be different if you want.”

Faith's heart squeezed in her chest. “You can be different anywhere, can't you?”

“Not when you're eleven.”

Pavel leaned forward, dropping his forearms on the table to look right at Alex. “You are a very different eleven-year-old. I can see that already.”

“I'm an inventor.”

“If you'd given me another minute, I would have guessed that.”

“Really?”

Faith watched Pavel enchant her son. Despite his casual, almost sloppy appearance, he was a born charmer. His eyes were wide-set, slightly tilted and darkly lashed, and he knew how to focus them so the person he talked to felt bathed in their warmth. He had the strongly defined bone structure of a Slav and an Irishman's knack for using all his assets without seeming to be aware of any of them.

“You have an interesting boy here, Faith.”

Faith pulled herself out of her reverie. “I've always thought so.”

“Every family needs an inventor.”

Alex's inventions were one of the few things Faith and David had disagreed about. David wanted to use “invention time” as a reward to make their son finish homework and chores. Faith believed Alex should have more control over when and how he worked.

Now the choice was hers alone.

“Is there an inventor in your family?” Alex asked Pavel.

“I'm my own family, so I have to be a jack-of-all-trades.”

Faith was surprised he wasn't married with children of his own. Perhaps he had a partner or lover. She wondered what Dottie Lee could tell her.

She searched for a safer subject. “Didn't you tell me your house was a work in progress? Does that mean you're in the midst of renovations?”

“Eternally. I'm doing the work myself.”

Faith was sure her eyes brightened noticeably. “Are you?”

“Do I detect a note of special interest? One renovator to another?”

“Honestly? I don't know how to do a blessed thing except wield a paintbrush. But I'm going to learn.”

“I saw the inside of that house, remember? You're biting off a lot.”

“I'm not going to rewire the house myself and burn it down. You don't happen to have a list of contractors, do you?”

“Around here, that's like asking for the keys to somebody's safety deposit box.”

“No kidding?”

“I have a list. I might share in exchange for a home-cooked meal. We barter here, too.”

She laughed, and she wasn't even sure why. She was in no mood to entertain. In fact she might never be in the mood to entertain a man again.

Entertain a man. She sobered quickly. Until that moment, Pavel had seemed like nothing more than a neighborhood find with shoulders wide enough to hold up a piano and hands that could plaster or plumb.

She was getting a divorce. She was almost in the position to entertain a man. She had never expected to be in that position again.

“Is your cooking that bad?” Pavel's eyes sparkled.

“No, but apparently my social skills are. I'm sorry, I'd invite you in a minute, but you haven't seen my kitchen.”

“That bad?”

“Abysmal.”

“Would you like me to give it the once-over? One renovator to another?”

She wasn't sure how to refuse. The offer was nothing more than friendly, and she needed all the advice he could give. “Right now the path's blocked with boxes, but maybe by day's end. Why don't you just stop by next time you're on the street?”

“I'll do that.”

Faith became aware of Remy's stare. She met her daughter's eyes and saw more hostility than usual.

“Maybe when you come over I could show you what I'm doing to my computer,” Alex said. “Do you like computers?”

“Absolutely.” Pavel pushed back his chair. “I'd better be off. I've got a sink to install this morning. I haven't had running water in my kitchen for…” He counted on his fingers. “Five months.”

Faith groaned. He nodded in sympathy. “Prepare yourself for the long haul,” he warned.

Pavel got to his feet, towering over the table for a moment. He stuck out his hand, and Alex took it, man to man. “I'll look forward to seeing your inventions.” He nodded to Faith and Remy; then he was gone.

Remy threw her napkin on the table. “Mother, who is that man?”

“He's a neighbor. Remember I told you about a man who helped the movers when the piano—”

“You don't know him? All you know is he can move a piano? And you invited him to our house?”

Faith felt anger flare. “I haven't heard of a single serial killer on the loose here, Remy. He's a neighbor, not Jack the Ripper.”